March 6, 2008
Opera star, 100-voice combined choirs, symphony combine for ‘A Sea Symphony’ March 14
World-renowned opera performer Jane Eaglen will make her UW School of Music performance debut, along with Northwest tenor Gregory Carroll, when Peter Eros conducts the 100-voice combined choirs and University Symphony in A Sea Symphony, Vaughan Williams’ evocative tour de force for choir, soloists and orchestra.
The concert will be at 7:30 p.m. Friday, March 14, in Meany Theater. Tickets are $15 for general admission and $10 for students and seniors. Advance ticket purchasing is encouraged and tickets are available through the UW Arts Ticket Office, 206-543-4880, or through www.meany.org.
A Sea Symphony established Williams as the foremost English composer of his generation. His epic setting of texts from American poet Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass was the first of nine symphonies he would compose. An organist and choir director, Williams was comfortable composing for choral performance, but turned to French composer Maurice Ravel, working with him for three months, to gain the confidence he needed to complete the orchestral parts for A Sea Symphony. A Sea Symphony is in four movements: “A Song for All Seas,” “All Ships; On the Beach at Night,” “Alone; Scherzo: The Waves”; and “The Explorers.”
Soprano Jane Eaglen commands one of the most formidable reputations in the opera world today, garnering spectacular reviews worldwide for her portrayals of such iconic roles as Isolde (for the Metropolitan Opera, Seattle Opera, Teatro Liceu Barcelona, Lyric Opera of Chicago and in Puerto Rico); Leonore (debuted for the Seattle Opera) and Brünnhilde (performed in Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco, Milan, New York, Oslo, and the United Kingdom).
Eaglen records with Sony Classical; her many solo albums include arias by Wagner and Bellini, arias by Strauss and Mozart; works by Strauss and other song cycles and Italian Opera Arias. Her recording of Wagner’s Tannhauser with Barenboim for Teldec earned a Grammy for Best Complete Opera. Eaglen also is featured on Sony’s soundtrack for the film adaptation of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility. She became an artist in residence at the UW in 2006. She also was principle vocal instructor for the Seattle Opera’s Young Artist Program during the 2006-07 season. Ms. Eaglen annually returns to teach and mentor the San Francisco Opera Merola Program and Cardiff International Academy of Voice.
Tenor Gregory Carroll has won numerous awards and was second runner-up at the regional Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions last year. For the 2007-2008 season his engagements will include his debut as a tenor in multiple performances of Handel’s Messiah as well as his farewell to baritone repertoire in Britten’s Cantata Misericordium with Opus 7 Vocal Ensemble, Gounod’s Messe Solennelle de Sainte Cecile with the Northwest Symphony Orchestra, and Dvořák’s Stabat Mater at St. James Cathedral.
A frequent soloist with many of the Northwest’s leading choirs, orchestras and ensembles, Carroll has toured Europe five times in recent years, singing in Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, Germany, and Hungary.
Previously, as a baritone, Carroll sang performances on the opera and concert stages with institutions throughout the Northwest such as the American Sinfonietta, the Tacoma Symphony Orchestra, the Victoria Chamber Orchestra and the Whatcom Symphony Orchestra. Carroll has sung with the Seattle Opera Chorus and is currently a Cathedral Soloist at St. James Cathedral. He teaches voice privately and at the Midsummer Musical Retreat in addition to being a guest clinician and adjudicator at regional contests and festivals.
